Truthful Fiction About Israel
Explore truthful fiction about Israel with our curated list of books that blend authentic narratives and compelling storytelling. Discover novels that capture the essence of Israeli life, history, and culture.
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The Source
by James A. Michener
In his signature style of grand storytelling, James A. Michener transports us back thousands of years to the Holy Land. Through the discoveries of modern archaeologists excavating the site of Tell Makor, Michener vividly re-creates life in an ancient city and traces the profound history of the Jewish people—from the persecution of the early Hebrews, the rise of Christianity, and the Crusades to the founding of Israel and the modern conflict in the Middle East. An epic tale of love, strength, and faith, The Source is a richly written saga that encompasses the history of Western civilization and the great religious and cultural ideas that have shaped our world. Praise for The Source “Fascinating . . . stunning . . . [a] wonderful rampage through history . . . Biblical history, as seen through the eyes of a professor who is puzzled, appalled, delighted, enriched and impoverished by the spectacle of a land where all men are archeologists.”—The New York Times “A sweeping [novel] filled with excitement—pagan ritual, the clash of armies, ancient and modern: the evolving drama of man’s faith.”—The Philadelphia Inquirer “Magnificent . . . a superlative piece of writing both in scope and technique . . . one of the great books of this generation.”—San Francisco Call Bulletin
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The Book of Abraham
by Marek Halter
Chronicling nearly two thousand years of history, this panoramic saga follows the destiny of Abraham, a Jewish scribe, and his descendants from the burning of Jerusalem under the Romans to the 1943 battle of the Warsaw ghetto.
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Masada
by Gloria D. Miklowitz
In the year 72 C.E., after a four-year war between Rome and Judea, only one fortress remains to be taken: Masada, high above the Dead Sea in what is now Israel. Two years later, the commander of the famous Roman Tenth Legion, Flavius Silva, marches toward Masada to capture or kill the 960 Jewish zealots who hold it. In this eloquent and powerful novel, we meet 17-year-old Simon ben Eleazar, son of the Jewish leader of Masada. Apprenticed too Masada s only physician, Simon learns to help victims of the enemy s onslaught as he struggles with his love for Deborah, the intended of his best friend, and with the painful decision he must ultimately make.
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Four Mothers
by Shifra Horn
This beautifully imagined debut novel tells the story of five generations of women in one family against the backdrop of 100 years in Jerusalem. Starting with the birth of the family's first boy to the last generation, this epic is rich in the magical realism of fable and folklore.
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Four Meals
by Meir Shalev
Four Meals is the extraordinary story of Zayde, his enigmatic mother Judith and her three lovers.When Judith arrives in a small, rural village in Palestine in the early 1930s, three men compete for her attention: Globerman, the cunning, coarse cattle-dealer who loves women, money and flesh; Jacob, owner of hundreds of canaries and host to the four meals which lend the book its narrative structure; and Moshe, a widowed farmer obsessed with his dead wife and his lost braid of hair which his mother cut off in childhood.During the four meals, which take place intermittently over several decades, Zayde slowly comes to understand why these three men consider him their son and why all three participate in raising him.
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Exodus
by Leon Uris
“Passionate summary of the inhuman treatment of the Jewish people in Europe, of the exodus in the nineteenth and twentieth centuries to Palestine, and of the triumphant founding of the new Israel.”—The New York Times Exodus is an international publishing phenomenon—the towering novel of the twentieth century's most dramatic geopolitical event. Leon Uris magnificently portrays the birth of a new nation in the midst of enemies—the beginning of an earthshaking struggle for power. Here is the tale that swept the world with its fury: the story of an American nurse, an Israeli freedom fighter caught up in a glorious, heartbreaking, triumphant era. Here is Exodus—one of the great bestselling novels of all time.
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The Haj
by Leon Uris
“The narrative is fast paced, bursting with action, and obviously based on an intimate grasp of the region, its peoples, their tradition and age-old ways of life.”—John Barkham Reviews Leon Uris retums to the land of his acclaimed best-seller Exodus for an epic story of hate and love, vengeance and forgiveness and forgiveness. The Middle East is the powerful setting for this sweeping tale of a land where revenge is sacred and hatred noble. Where an Arab ruler tries to save his people from destruction but cannot save them from themselves. When violence spreads like a plague across the lands of Palestine—this is the time of The Haj.
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The Hope
by Herman Wouk
Taking readers from 1948 to 1967 in Sinai, Jerusalem, and Washington, D.C., a stunning depiction of the conflicts that shaped the struggling nation of Israel follows the adventures of a sinister Mossad man, a religious ace fighter pilot, the daughter of a CIA man, and more. Reprint. 12,000 first printing.
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The Glory
by Herman Wouk
Like no other novelist at work today, Herman Wouk has managed to capture the sweep of history in novels rich in character and alive with drama. In "The Hope," which opens in 1948 and culminates in the miraculous triumph of 1967's Six-Day War, Wouk plunges the reader into the story of a nation struggling for its birth and then its survival. As the tale resumes in "The Glory," Wouk portrays the young nation once again pushed to the brink of annihilation -- and sets the stage for today's ongoing struggle for peace. Taking us from the Sinai to Jerusalem, from dust-choking battles to the Entebbe raid, from Camp David to the inner lives of such historical figures as Golda Meir, Moshe Dayan, and Anwar Sadat, these extraordinary novels have the authenticity and authority of Wouk's finest fiction -- and together strike a resounding chord of hope for all humanity.
